Liberating Mankind From the Comfort of My Bedroom

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Humans beings are born with the innate need to feel. Throughout life – as a baby, a toddler, a child, an adolescent, teen, youth, young adult, adult and elderly person – this need is the focus of everything we do.

Babies cry because they want attention, they need to feel loved. Toddlers waggle their arms to be picked up because they want to feel comforted, they need to feel cherished. Even when we’re older, we date or marry people because we have this seemingly insatiable need to feel wanted.

But wait, you’re probably thinking, what about people who DON’T feel? Now, I know I’m thinking of it from a black and white perspective, but it is impossible to ‘not feel’. The first connection we make when we think of feelings is one of happiness; we assume that in order to effectively ‘feel’ it has to be good feelings. It doesn’t. Bad feelings – feelings of doubt, guilt, fear, depression – are feelings just the same. At the end of the day, everyone feels something. It might not be the same as we grow up, and yes, even evil people feel things too (though exactly what, we may never understand) but everyone feels something; and some to a greater emotional extent than others. Even psychopaths supposedly have the same breadth of emotions as everyone else, they just don’t ‘attend’ to their emotions the same way that everyone else does.

In general though, the most widely sought-after feeling is that of a need; to be wanted, to be loved, to feel like you matter to someone. This is what drives the majority of our daily lives, from childhood all the way up to retirement age. We want to feel like we have people who care for us and love us. This is why we at first develop friendships; from an early age especially, friendships teach us how we feel that we should be loved, how worthy we feel of this love and also how we feel that we should care for others. This is why that when we first start to develop friendships, it is so important that we are taught our self-worth and value; because when we have little or no self-worth, then we don’t have particularly high expectations for the love we feel like we should receive.

The start of someone’s life is the most important part; it makes them who they are. Each mistake, each tear, each success, each failure; but the important part of the learning and growing process is that they are all feelings.

For me, feelings play a huge part in my life. I get very easily attached to people who I feel are worthwhile people to have in my life, in both platonic and romantic senses, and at times, it can be very difficult for me to let go. My need to feel loved, to feel wanted and to feel appreciated drives nearly every single one of my relationships with friends and with family. In the past, as I think I’ve probably mentioned (or slyly indirected) I’ve lost quite a few people who I once considered my really close friends, or ‘best friends’ as some people would refer to them. And yes, losing friends is sad, and it hurts a lot, and it can take a long time to get over. To some extent, I would argue that I never really ‘get over’ things, but just learn ways to cope and move on.

So this is where the title comes in – after my long, and mostly necessary ramble. A while ago (about a year ago now, WHOA time flies!), I was chilling with Dezza and trying to explain to her my interpersonal relationships with others. I described it to her using the simple example of a tessellation diagram:

Imagine a blank white page. Now draw a hexagon. Now draw another one connected to it. Keep drawing hexagons until your page is a tessellation filled with empty-looking hexagons.

This is the structure of my relationships. The ’tiles’ closer to the upper left are some of the oldest ones; the tiles further down and to the right are new ones that are added. Pretend that there is a name painted in black on every single tile; these are all the people I interact with regularly, occasionally or infrequently. The oldest tiles, the ones that are broken and cracked, are often the ones that I have tried to remove, but with disastrous consequences. You see, the longer you leave these hexagonal ’tiles’, the more difficult they are to pull up without completely shattering the tile altogether; over time, and without care or attention, they become neglected, brittle and subject to fracturing.

On the other side, you have the newer tiles, that are being added as I write at this very moment. These tiles are the ones that are shinier and new, but only time will tell how well they wear. (That’s a bit of a mouthful: only time will tell how well they wear…) And then you have the tiles somewhere in the middle that are neither old nor recent but are very shiny; they are the ’tiles’ that I regularly attend, cleaning, polishing and filling in any cracks which appear when cracks start to show.

Some new tiles don’t last very long; sometimes the names written on them are quickly scratched over before the ‘paint’ can dry and replaced with new, more worthwhile names. Old tiles only remain because taking them out of the tessellation altogether would mean… well, it just wouldn’t be a tessellation; as much as many relationships I’ve had have been somewhat questionable, there is no doubt that I would not be the person I am today if it weren’t for the mixture of both good and not-so-good experiences.

And that’s it, I guess.

That’s the positive outlook of the whole situation; even though not every friendship and relationship I’ve had has been positive or edifying for me as a person, they’ve all crafted me in ways which may not have made sense at the time, but start to make sense the older I get.

The more you age, I guess the less you realise you know and understand about things. I’m not trying to make out like I’m an ‘old soul’ far ahead of her peers, but there are certainly (as it goes without saying) things that I’m still learning. I’d like to think I’ve become a lot more sensible in choosing my friends and surrounding myself with encouraging people who understand me and support me, and give me the opportunity and the privilege of being able to reciprocate as well. I don’t even have to @ anybody, because you all know who you are. 🙂

But yes, that’s it from me for the evening.

In the (fictional) words of Albert (and then Sir Robert Peel): There it is.

Love from The Faerie Squad Mother x

p.s. I watched the next episode of ‘Victoria’ and their incestuous cuteness never fails to simultaneously shock me and move me to tears.

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Once again. I am always disappearing for long periods of time, and – honestly – so much has happened since I last blogged on the 1 August 2016. Unfortunately, I have no elaborate, eloquent essays like my last post, so this is simply pure, unadulterated rambling. No structure, no hidden messages, no propaganda.

Just my nonsense.

So what have you missed? First of all… well, not first of all, but one of the most important things: I turned 17. (Wahey!) This is a milestone in UK terms because (also most importantly) I can start to learn how to drive. I am also one year closer to getting married without my parent’s permission; this, naturally, is obviously the number one goal.

I’m kidding mum, that is obviously NOT the number one goal. 🙂

Secondly, I’ve made new friends. I say new friends, I mean friends who have literally fallen into my lap due to entirely unforeseen circumstances. As I, often do, never directly use their names, Cameron – as she is called for an entirely justifiable reason – is a new friend I have discovered, to be politically correct, who shares my love (pun intended) for words, writing, racial politics and humour. I’m low-key glad I’m talking to her now, too. There has been the development of my friendship with Spaceboi who is, in fact, a boy from space, because he is out of this world. Literally. He also still owes me Welsh soil. (Even though he’s dying and he can’t swallow. #GetBetterSoon) And as a new edition to my shiny card collection of friends, Bag Juice, so named for his favourite beverage in Jamaica (yes, I also went to Jamaica for the summer) is – I have discovered – my ‘long-lost cousin’, whose laugh makes me laugh.

As a matter of fact, he’s on the phone to me as I write this. Bag Juice, as in. As he has just brazenly told me, after a small dispute over GCSEs, “I know bare.” What a legend. Truly inspirational words from an inspirational young man.

(I was going to start the next paragraph with the word ‘also’ but because he’s now at A-Level and thinks he’s a bit cool, Bag Juice suggested that I start with the word ‘conjointly’. I’ve never even heard of it before in my life. He now tells me I should look it up in a dictionary or a thesaurus, because of course, “he knows bare.”)

Conjointly, I have continued my current studies in A-Levels, continuing on with the ever-stressful English Literature, Spanish (now so rapid that I’m surprised I’m not told to bring a life-jacket to every lesson) and History, which is the only thing that is keeping me going right now anyway. But I don’t have a choice, and so I am aiming for that #AcademicExcellence because I intend to make the best of this year. Especially since last year didn’t exactly go to plan. And, naturally, I do not want a repeat of the academic DISASTER (to put it lightly) that was the school term of 2015.

I’m kidding mum, it wasn’t a COMPLETE disaster. 🙂

[Update: Bag Juice has now gone. It’s just me now; thank goodness he’s left me to blog in PEACE!]

Praise the Lord, though, that I got an A and C in my AS Levels. The A was (entire unsurprisingly) in Drama and the C was in Spanish, and even though, sadly, I have been forced to drop Drama – and will subsequently miss my husband Torvald, and my Polish twin sister Caroline, and Turkey, and just everyone in the class – God helped me to pass my Spanish. No, but honestly, it had to be Him, because there is not a chance in Hell (ha! see what I did there?) that I was able to understand a single word on that test paper.

It was all Greek to me. (I’m kidding mum, I obviously revised for it. 🙂 )

Also, on the theme of #AcademicExcellence, I’ve recently deleted my Instagram and Snapchat – and I couldn’t have chosen a better time, really – so that I can focus on my work and my spiritual life as I realised they’re literally two of the biggest distractions for me. I’ve only been accessing them illicitly when it is 100% necessary. (I’m kidding mum, I don’t illegally sneak onto them on my laptop. 🙂 )

Since the tearful and heart-wrenching ending of Downton Abbey, and the anxious wait for the next season of Velvet to be released on Netflix, I have found a new program to alleviate my desperate and insatiable longing for period dramas; Victoria, on ITV. We only have a slight problem – well, I say it’s a slight problem, when in reality it’s a large problem that brings about very worrying developments and has even worse implications; Victoria and Albert, the cutest televised historical couple that I have seen to date, are related.

“But that’s not so bad!”, I hear you cry. “All the British Royal family are inbred!” (You wouldn’t be wrong if you did say this; our current Queen Elizabeth and her husband are second cousins once removed). But wait! Victoria and Albert – the cutest televised historical couple that I have seen to date – are not only related; they are *drum roll*FIRST COUSINS! (Gasp! Shock! Horror!)

What shocks me the most though, is not that they are related or that they had 9 kids (and that’s at LEAST 9 sex – 9 too MUCH sex for first cousins, in my humble opinion), but the fact that despite knowing this shocking fact, I am still high-key gunning for their sweetly romantic relationship.

In other words, I am high-key gunning for incest. (Please feel free to quote me; you will never hear these words come out of my mouth at any other point in my life). What’s wrong with me? I mean, I know I’m a nerd for history, but I’m NOT a nerd for incest and there is never any excusable justification for this practice, right?

I’m kidding mum, I don’t support incest. 🙂

Anyhow. We’ve lost a key member of our History band, which was named ‘Volksgemeinschaft’; now Babs has left and our topic has changed in History (Civil Rights in America from 1865 – 1992) we’ve had to rename ourselves ‘The White Citizens’ Council’. Which is just historical banter, but PLEASE don’t assume that we’re only made up of racist white people, because I am neither racist nor white. I don’t know about the others though… I know for a fact that Mags has admitted to being a white supremacist on the weekends, and she does own an uncanny amount of white bedsheets?

I’m kidding mum, none of my friends are white supremacists. 🙂

Speaking of white supremacy, I also want to say, a HUGE congratulations (and shout out) to the KKK, who would have been in existence – by December 24th of this year – for 151 years! Yes, you’ve read that entirely correctly! The fun-loving, all-hating, Christian band of ‘lovable rogues’ (as I, so gingerly, put it) have been up and running for 151 years! Since December 1865, who would have thought that they would have STILL (yes, that’s right, STILL, because they have an official website and everything!) been alive and well in September of 2016?

Certainly not me. That’s who. (Especially to all those who think we live in a ‘post-racial’ society, they are a group who were literally born out of racist ideologies and stand for white supremacy and are still today being supported by American citizens.)

But let’s not dwell on the positives, eh?

My writing attempts since 1 August have been somewhat faulty; did that sentence even make sense? Probably not. Goes to show, right? But when I was in Jamaica, I kept a diary of the goings-on (for about a week or two) which I tried to start off emotionally-neutrally, but ended up failing and just revealing the depths of my soul to. The worrying thing is, even though I know it’s at home, I can’t remember where I put that notebook. (I’m kidding mum, not the depths of my soul.) But I don’t doubt I will shortly find it and be able to burn whatever necessary incriminating pages.

I’m kidding mum, I’m not going to burn any of it, it’s all evidence to be used against me in the future. 🙂

And on that note, I think it’s time for me to once again depart and leave the heart of my blog empty and waiting for me to return at sporadic intervals, whenever I gather the ability to write.

Farewell, until next time,

The Faerie Squad Mother x

p.s. I’m kidding mum.

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I know the title of this post is long and somewhat laborious, but I thought it the best phrase to even partially express the sentiments of my post. I’ve been thinking about it for a while, how disloyal and selfish human beings can be, especially in terms of our relationships. Our intentions and emotions are forever changing, the shifts in our relationships meant to accommodate those respective emotional modifications – more often than not, however, with such revisions only considering the person making the changes.

Not all changes are purposeless, I’m sure it goes without saying. There are toxic relationships which need to be eliminated; no matter how much one tries to justify abusive relationships (emotional, verbal or physical in either a romantic or platonic situation) there is little else more damaging in the life of the average human being. And of course, people change. Admitting such only further stresses the necessity to be rid of certain burdensome associations, as the person they have become is, of course, NOT the same person whom you initially befriended.

Sometimes it’s funny to think how much people change. In general, change is a positive thing, but it can also be a stumbling block in the way of relationships. Anybody you know, at any time without warning, could decide they no longer want to be a part of your life, be it a boyfriend, a best friend, a parent, a relative, whoever. They have the ability to choose to destabilize even the most sturdy and reliable of relationships, though I suppose whether they have the right to is another question altogether. But like it or not, it happens. And people do change, suddenly, without warning, leaving your friendship in broken shards or your relationship in pieces of fragmented heart – and there you are, wondering what you did wrong.

But when you really think it about it, it’s not always other people changing. A lot of the time, it’s ourselves. We change – be it for better or for worse.

We become more mature, or immature. We grow emotionally, mentally, spiritually, or we regress. We think differently, we meet new people, we explore and discover things which we have never before seen the like. Or we don’t. Whatever the case, these changes in us affect our currently-existing relationships, either negatively or positively, depending on the respective change in the other party as well.

When your best friends looks at you, and notes with disgust in her voice, “You’ve changed”, she’s not lying. You HAVE changed. It’s just that those changes have now made you the better person and put you at an assumed advantage in that friendship; and she doesn’t like those changes. The problem is not that you have changed. The problem is that she HASN’T.

When you watch your best friend looking at you with sad eyes as you tell her sympathetically, “I’ve changed”, although she doesn’t want to believe it, you have. It’s just that those changes in you have left your relationship undefined and in new, uncharted territories, and now offers you neither comfort nor happiness. The problem might not be that she hasn’t changed. Perhaps the problem is that you have.

But change should never be the foundation upon which a relationship is built. Too often, people make friends or date someone with the intention of ‘changing’ them, which is effectively saying, “I won’t accept you as you are; you must fit into MY mould.” No matter how you want to look at it, it’s often selfish – the ‘fixer-upper’ ideology – but also dangerous. Building relationships purely on the projected view of what you envision the person to have become after you have finished ‘changing’ them, means that you are never content with people as they are. You simply want them to be your version of themselves.

And staying in a relationship because of a change you hope to happen is also not a great idea. I mean, I know that many times the only thing standing between you and a successful friendship or happy marriage is a bad habit, but the assumption that the other person will change purely to satisfy your needs within that relationship is also not great. It means that you will hang onto relationships way past their ‘sell-by’ date purely because of the misguided hope that they will change; not just for the better, but also in the specific way that you want them to.

Yes, there are cases where people can change, when they realise that they have an issue or some other insurmountable problem which stands in the way of a fruitful relationship with you, but THEY are the only ones able to dictate when that change will come about. You cannot neither force nor expect someone to change. Change comes about naturally, and though you may make the person aware of their flaw or whatever other imperfections, they have the ultimate choice as to whether to act upon it or ignore your counsel and seek a happy relationship elsewhere.

Sometimes change is necessary for growth. A snake cannot grow without shedding its skin, and though this may be a somewhat difficult process, leaving behind the old allows you to move forward into the new. Not every relationship you have will always be long-lasting. Some are superficial and have their ‘expiration dates’, and that’s okay. Of course, it’s important to recognise such friendships; because they are so short-lived and intense, they can drain you as they are often emotionally demanding and exhaust your energy reserves, not to mention, your mobile contract.

And of course, I am speaking in the assumption that only one party of the relationship changes. It is likely that both could change. If you both change for the better, growing together and developing healthily through your relationship, then despite changing times or seasons, your relationship will go the distance. If you both change for the worse, despite your identical poor choices, you may stay together, both blissfully unaware of your regression. If one changes for the better and one changes for the worse, it is likely that the former will become hyper-aware of their respective changes and either make the latter aware of their flaws or leave them.

What I’m trying to say is, in every situation, there are lessons to be learned. Whether one of you or both of you change, or even don’t change, there is always something about you which can be improved, if you are willing to be open to positive growth and constructive criticism.

As I noted in the title, the natural nature of human beings appears to be irrevocably fickle and it is becoming abundantly clear that we are consistent in only one thing – inconsistency.

I’m not entirely sure how to end this, as I realise that my blog post very closely resembles one of my equally pretentious essays for English Literature. I suppose I can only say that I am perhaps misguided on many things which I’ve commented on, but that I hope it offers insight for some people and that it is, for the most part, relatable.

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I think it’s really funny how some people seem really surprised that I’ve suddenly begun to talk more about racial issues and such, not just on my blog but also in real life.

I’d just like to let everyone into a little secret: I’ve always been talking about this stuff.

It’s just that when I used to talk about it, I tried to keep my voice as quiet as possible so that nobody complains that they’re offended or that I’m a ‘racist intolerant’ or whatever else. But now, I’ve made a conscious choice to make my voice heard.

I also find it really funny how before, when I was content to quietly mumble about social injustices with my friends, there was never a reaction, but the instant that I find and use my VOICE and on my personal BLOG of all places (what am I thinking? How RUDE of me; my PERSONAL blog?!) people suddenly make a fuss about my opinions.

I bet if I was to post a blog complaining about the Instagram update and saying how unacceptable it was, people would comment things like, “This is so true! THERE IS SO MUCH INJUSTICE IN THE WORLD!!!!!” or “I’m so glad SOMEONE said something! I thought I was the only one!” or even “I actually think it’s alright.” Even if I was to post entirely in (probably very poor) Spanish, I guarantee people would still comment, “I couldn’t understand anything but this is so true!” Even my post about my somewhat controversial religious beliefs didn’t elicit the level of hate and disagreement that my racial post from Sunday did – both online and IRL. But when I post about racial issues people tell me, “You make this all up” and “You’re not even oppressed. Go live in a third world country and see what oppression REALLY is” and “Stop complaining! You’re not helping your own situation by fulfilling stereotypes!” (Which, may I just ask, stereotypes do I fulfil?)

Plus, oppression is relative. Just because I don’t live in a third-world country or somewhere where many women are openly treated as subordinates, doesn’t mean I am not still at a disadvantage in my own country. I’ve mentioned before, I’m a black female. I live in a Western Society, where the institutions cater for White Heterosexual Rich/Middle-Class Cishet Males before anybody else. This means that within my own native system, I am at a disadvantage. And I think people think of oppression and imagine slavery being reintroduced into society; but it’s a lot more than that. Oppression is about how prejudice and discrimination has become institutionalised and normalised to the point where a specific set of people are benefitting – and it just so happens that I am not a person who is actively benefitting from the system.

I mentioned in my #BodyPostivity and Letter to my 8-year old self post that I’m learning to love myself and that nobody can make me feel inferior without my permission. Which is very true. In the past couple of days, because of the reactions to real life and on-line situations, I’ve begun to doubt the validity of my voice and my opinions. But then I get slapped back into reality and realise, “Why am I letting bitter, ignorant people limit my voice?”

And I realise that, as much as I don’t like confrontation, some things have to be said. It has taken me SO long to climb out of the box that I was put in from Primary School, and I’m still on my self-love journey. I literally cannot believe that I would even consider taking any anonymous person;s comments to heart. I literally cannot believe that anyone would take time out of their day to read through a post, become offended by the literal truth and then decide to share their negativity – to be honest, I love hearing from my fans. Especially the bitter ones. (Plus, I’m flattered you think me so significant!)

Anyway, let’s not dwell on negativity.

I had an exam yesterday, a written one for Drama. Which went really well. We had to sit two papers; a live theatre and a studied play script. For my playscript, we studied Henrik Ibsen’s ‘A Doll’s House’. If you HAVE read it or had to perform it then I feel sorry for you if you had to be Nora. If you haven’t, maybe do in your free time. It’s an interesting play definitely, but you have to take into consideration a lot of contextual factors. Interestingly, it touches upon issues of female subordination, to an extent, because – long story short – the play centres around a married couple, Nora and Torvald Helmer. They live in 19th century Norway, and Nora is literally treated like a child by her husband – a doll, in a sense of speaking, hence the title. It’s actually SO weird, he calls her all sorts of weird, dodgy pet names, and she loves it, but she’s quite manipulative.

To be honest, their marriage is just a disaster waiting to happen.

But in the end (SPOILER aha) she leaves him after a LOT of unnecessary and avoidable drama because she realises that she has become such a trophy wife and a pet to him that she doesn’t even know who she is herself. She says she wants to discover herself or whatever, so she leaves him with the children.

Great story.

But anyway. I have an exam next Tuesday for Spanish Listening, Reading and Writing which should be VERY interesting, seeing as I’m a lot worse at Spanish than I initially realised. I’m sitting in my study periods, and I’ve just spent about an hour practicing Spanish words and phrases and grammar etc. (Memrise is actually fantastic. It is keeping me going this year in Spanish, I swear!)

Because of the fact that my AS subjects have technically ended, I now have two mornings and two afternoons off from school, which is literally fantastic because it means I can go home earlier and I’M SO READY FOR SUMMER NOW.

PLEASE HURRY UP JULY!

Because they’ve changed the system and as of next year, AS-Levels will technically no longer be a thing, they’re introduced these new exams which are like UCAS Prediction exams, so that when we apply for University (next September, I think, we start) then you have the Predicted Grades from the ‘official’ University system, I suppose.

Which sucks because it means more unnecessary and stressful exams. But whatever.

I need to do some more Spanish.

Adiós.

Love the Faerie Squad Mother x

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In Spanish, when you ask someone what their name is, rather than saying ‘¿Cuál es tu nombre?’ (What is your name? – which supposedly, is more formal), you say ‘¿Cómo te llamas?’ The literal translation of this is, ‘How do you call yourself?’

I’ve always thought this an interesting concept, because I think there is quite a difference between asking someone what their name is and asking them what they are called. I could be entirely unnecessarily building this difference up, but let’s see, shall we?

The opening sentence for the story I am currently writing is:

“Many people say that the first gift you are ever given is your name.”

In many ways, a name is a gift. The protagonist goes on to mention how the meaning of your name can shape who you are and give you the ability to do amazing things.

According to Google, ‘name’ is a noun which means a word or set of words by which a person or thing is known, addressed, or referred to. Therefore, asking someone what their name is, is asking them what title they are known as. More often than not, names carry some level of significance, be it culturally, socially or domestically. For example, names convey class and status. Someone named ‘Jane Boggs’ for instance, is perhaps not as highly socially regarded as someone called ‘Penelope Clarington’.

Names also convey meaning.

My name, ‘Rianna’ is a variant of the Welsh name ‘Rhiannon’. According to ‘Behind the Name’ (which, may I add, is a very exciting website to use) this means ‘Great Queen’. Which I completely was. My surname, ‘Davis’ is similarly a popular Welsh surname, and according to some quick googling, it originated from the Davidson clan in Scotland. But is mostly now used in Wales and England.

Names also convey cultural heritage.

Which, it is, at this point, that we shall have to pause for a moment. Because, I mean, I don’t know how obvious it is, but clearly, my ancestors were neither Welsh nor Scottish. I have a very Welsh sounding name, especially in its pre-derivative form (‘Rhiannon David’) and this gives absolutely no clue as to my origins, except pointing back to slavery.

In fact, the only thing I can tell conclusively from my name is that my ancestors were once owned by a ‘Davis’ family. Because that’s effectively what it tells me. I have no other link with my heritage because my name (here it comes again) has been erased and scribbled over with somebody else’s name, effectively denying me the privilege of knowing and understanding my cultural heritage.

So what makes me very sad is when people have their cultural heritage (due to their beautifully, rich-sounding names and/or surnames) and choose to reject them because of society’s Eurocentric standards. Don’t get me wrong, I completely understand the stigma there is around ‘African-sounding’ names, and I get that obviously many people will be eager to change their names so they don’t ‘sound black’. And that sounds bad, but you have to consider the fact that we do live in a White Supremacist world, so everyone in Western societies feels like they have to conform to a Western societal standard. Which, to some extent you do in order to get by.

In the West, ‘Babatunde’ isn’t a beautiful, meaningful name. In the West, ‘Babatunde’ mostly connotes ‘freshie’, ‘African savage’. It doesn’t hold the same cultural meaning that it does from its’ roots. In the West, anything that sounds remotely ‘ethnic’ is mostly laughed at and scorned (unless it’s at the Kardashians’ or Jenners’ initiation, of course) and because of these culturally-rich names, people are denied the chances to jobs and such because interviewers see their application and immediately recognise the person applying is clearly not white-British. Or alternatively, recognise that this person is African and want to hire them as evidence that their workplace is not racist because of their ‘multi-culturally diverse’ employees.

So we return to my name. As lovely as my name is (gracias a mis padres) and as much as I don’t want to change it (because I don’t even know what I’d change it to!) there is a part of me that wishes my name wasn’t so ‘bland’ and ‘whitewashed’ so that I was able to trace my heritage right back to its roots.

That’s why people denying their cultural names because they get teased for them make me sad, because they have the opportunity to know where they come from, what part of Africa their ancestors live in, or lived in. As much as there is a huge stigma around these names, and lots of racist stereotyping and such, the under-appreciation of these names really upsets me. I mean, society teaches us to really hate ourselves, gosh! Not just the way we appear and the way we look, but also the way we refer to ourselves; which comes right back to the point I was making at the beginning. When you ask someone “What is your name?” (because English is such a great language, we only have one way of asking that) and they tell you their middle name, because they are too ashamed to tell you their first name, they are not lying. They are telling you their name. They are telling you the words which have been attributed to them in order to identify them and the words which they are used to being addressed by.

But when you ask someone “Como te llamas?” (how do you call yourself? – I mean, I know it’s Spanish, but the point still remains), in my opinion, you aren’t just asking them what words they use to identify themselves. What someone is called is more than just what they are referred to. What someone calls themselves also says a lot about who they are. They could still answer this question with their middle name, because that is what they call themselves, and that is how they view themselves. They don’t necessarily want to associate with their culture or their heritage because of the stigma surrounding it, and it’s effectively them denying who they are.

I understand there is a lot of controversy surrounding this anyway, as in choosing ‘socially-accepted’ names over heritage names, and I probably see in it a more ‘black-and-white’ way than someone else who is actually in this predicament. And yes, I understand that society has a funny way of destroying our lives and culture from the roots up, but if you have those roots, why wouldn’t you reclaim them? Why would you want to let go of them, or feel ashamed, if you’re one of the few lucky ones to know where you come from? Why would you want to exchange thousands of years worth of your geographical history for a few decades of social prosperity but cultural ignorance? Maybe I’m asking a stupid question, but I think it’s a fair question, as someone who would love to get in touch with my own history.

And when I say history, I don’t mean that I want to be told that my ancestors were slaves in Jamaica and then probably slaves in England. I want to know my specific history. I want to know which country they were taken from in Africa. Which tribe they originated from. If that tribe still exists today. There’s so many gaps in my own knowledge of my personal history, because of the gaps in my name.

And society, especially Western society, makes you feel guilty that you name is unpronounceable, and forces you to shorten your name to make it less ‘ethnic’ and more ‘blandly ethnic’. I mean, disregarding the fact that they didn’t shorten slavery because it was ‘unstomachable’, how dare they try to strip people of their culture?

They don’t make us shorten Shakespeare’s name into something less ‘British’. Everyone can pronounce Truman Capote and Jack Kerouac, despite the fact that their names aren’t phonetic, and we’re taught how to pronounce them, and Scott F. Fitzgerald and Ernest Hemingway are never referred to as ‘Fitz’ and ‘Hems’.So why should you have to do that for a name that holds just as much significance for you culturally as the Union Jack does for the British?

I think I’m pretty much done with my rant about names, but before I finish up, I just want to drop this YouTube video of Button Poetry (my absolute FAVOURITE) and end on this note:

I don’t hate my name. I don’t feel any particularly strong way towards it, to be honest. My name is what I am referred to by. But my name is not who I am. My name cannot tell you – nor can anybody’s, for that matter – about my hopes and dreams, my aspirations, the person I am, my characteristic or my personality. But names have meanings, and names have significance. My name means something to my parents who chose to name me that. My name means something to people who know me and hear it, and think about me. My name means something to God and my name will one day mean something to even more people when it’s on the spine of a published book. Everyone’s name carries a significance. Appreciate your name and its’ meaning, no matter where you come from, no matter what your name is. Because your name is YOUR name, and if you don’t let them, then nobody can take it (or its’ meaning) away from you.

Peace out, (I wrote this all in my first two study periods LOL, I’m being productive!)

The Faerie Squad Mother x

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I’ve recently discovered one of my favourite phrases to use during my posts on this blog. This comes in many forms, but interestingly, they vary so much that I can’t even find some of these. After a quick search for them, I found a few, some of them being:

“I’ll post about that another time.”

“That’s a story for another day.”

“But I’ll write about that later.”

Amongst others. So I had a quick scroll through all my posts and found some things (but probably not all) that I said I would post about later, but never ended up posting.

Thinking About the Future (found in my second-ever post; I reference to the future a lot, but I don’t think that ‘Dear Future Husband‘ really counts as thinking about the future in a profound sort of way…)

Racist and Offensive Opinions of Small-Minded White People (which was in the recent rant about Black History, and I’m pretty I’ve mentioned it briefly before)

Street Shakespeare (when I was talking about my One-Man shows)

Why I Should Be Voted Prime Minister of England (does this even need context?)

A Rant About Visiting the Care Home with NCS (but the thing about rants is that you can only rant when you’re in the mood… so this post doesn’t seem like to happen)

Why Disney Sucks (but I always talk about this, though haven’t done an actual post dedicated to this… I suppose to some extent ‘Fairy Tales Should Be Illegal’ counts, but not really? I mean, that was more generic than specifically aimed at Disney)

How To Be A Boy 101 (long story short, I wrote 11 pages of this social satire when I was half-tired in Wales during NCS, at about 12 at night, and it made me cringe so much when I read it back; I literally indirected so much, and I know why now LMAO)

My 10 Questions (The Sisterhood of the World Blogger Award required me to write 10 questions, so I did, but I wanted to answer them myself. So maybe I shall)

Don’t get too excited. This post doesn’t mean that I have the intention to write about these all soon, but I will try my best. (No promises, because we know how well those have gone down, looking up at that 9 strong list there…) And this was just a quick post anyway.

Also, I have updated my site and its pages, so I’ve moved my ‘Exam Diaries‘ page, and now have an ‘Ask The Faerie Squad Mother‘ page, where you can drop comments and questions, and I’d love for you to do that as well. (I’ve put the links in there, in case you can’t find them, but they should be on the Menu along the bottom of your page.)

But that’s it today. Perhaps you would like me to post some of the points above, and maybe I will at some point. Keep reminding me. 🙂

Take care everybody, and have fun going back to school LOL.

The Faerie Squad Mother x

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The pen is mightier than the sword.

Thought it’d be a good idea to start my post off with both a thought-provoking title and a (mostly) overused quote, just so that you’re efficiently baffled. Perhaps you’re starting to form ideas in your mind already as to what I’m going to write about.

I was talking to my friend last night, and I can’t remember how exactly we got there, but we (REALLY) briefly touched upon the power of words. The conversation went a little bit like this:

Me: It’s so much fun. Writing these whole new worlds.

Him: Yeah I know. Funny how words can completely shape an environment/character.

Me: Yeah. Words are amazing. They can do so much man.

(And then, here comes the amazing bit…)

Me: That’s my next blog post. Words and their power.

So here I am. And here we are.

Let’s return to the quote from the beginning. I actually love this quote so much. “The pen is mightier than the sword.” It’s so relevant and so true. Allow me to enlighten you as to some of the many ways this quote is relevant. But first, some context.

This quote is attributed to the novelist and playwright Edward Bulwer-Lytton in 1839, in his historical play ‘Cardinal Richelieu’.

Francois: But now, at your command are other weapons, my good Lord.

Richelieu:The pen is mightier than the sword… take away the sword; States can be saved without it!

Now, since Richelieu is a priest, there is obviously the stigma that he is not allowed to take up arms against people who are trying to kill him. However, he acknowledges that even though he has no weapons, the power of words is more powerful than any weapon he could use. He even goes so far as to say that without armaments, entire states can be saved.

I haven’t read the play (the above was the result of some quick googling – thanks BBC) but context is always helpful. However, the BBC article also informed me that there were even earlier references to this path of thought.

A similar phrase appears in 1582, “The dashe of a Pen, is more greeuous then the counterbuse of a Launce.” (The dash of a pen is more grievous than the counter use of a lance.) Going back further, the Greek poet Euripides, is quoted as writing: “The tongue is mightier than the blade.” “Four hostile newspapers are more to be feared than 1,000 bayonets,” is another quote comparing a weapon to words, and is allegedly attributed to Napoleon.

So, what we learn here is that many people, not just writers and artists, but world leaders, and leading thinkers alike all seem to have the same train of thought. Let’s keep going.

According to Google definition, ‘The pen is mightier than the sword’ is an old proverb which means ‘writing is more effective than military power or violence.’ According to the Cambridge Dictionaries website, it means ‘thinking and writing have more influence on people and events than the use of force or violence.’

I could go on and on, but I think you get the point.

“But this cannot be!” You say. “How can something which simply emits ink onto a page be more powerful than that which can take lives?” (You’re probably NOT saying this – or at least, I hope you’re not – but just pretend you are for the purposes of this blog post).

Let’s look at this from a more literal standpoint.

The thing about a sword is that it has one purpose: to destroy. I very much doubt any soldier would have picked up a sword and thought “Hey, this would be GREAT to cut my nice block of cheddar with,” or “Perhaps this would look nice if I melted it down and made it into a necklace.” Swords are for killing, really. They don’t have much other purpose. The people who wield swords have one intention: to kill. Yes, swords can take away lives, and yes, they can rip lives apart because of the lives they have taken away.

The thing about a pen, however, is that it also has a purpose, but one which both reflects and counteracts the purpose of a sword: to destroy AND create. With a pen (or a metaphorical pen; I think typing counts too) authors have single-handedly crafted worlds, characters, Kingdoms, realms, and even re-created parts of history, all with its’ carefully wielded use. Yes, pens might not be able to physically kill people – although, I suppose it depends which pen you use – but, to an extent, they CAN physically kill people. Pens can also destroy. People used pens (or quills, rather) to sign death warrants. People write malice and hate-fuelled letters, which can tear someone’s life apart. Newspaper articles filled with slander can ruin someones career… or alternatively build them up. There is very little limit to the power of the pen.

A sword, on the other hand, would not be used for construction. What good can you do with a sword? Swords aren’t made to create. Pens are, however. And words do exactly that.

I also thought that the blog title was rather apt, because a sword, or any other weapon really, is a weapon of mass destruction. But a pen, being as it is, can be used as a weapon of mass construction. I think it’s amazing how powerful a simple word can be.

Words literally create a whole other realm of thought. Reading a book is not just an amazing feat for the reader (who, in a sense, is doing a bit of work on their part too, as no two readers view a book in the exact same way) but also for the person who wrote it. In order for you to have imagined the book, or the character, or the setting, in the way they would have wanted you to, surely that required a level of skilful use of words.

And don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that everyone is necessarily able to use words in terms of literature. But everyone uses their own powerful words in different ways. Some people (like myself) prefer to write their power. Some prefer to speak it. Some prefer to sing it. Some prefer to dream it.

But everything we do with words has some form of power, whether we recognise it or not.

Words were what the slaves used in their songs to empower themselves and each other in the darkest moments of their lives. Today, we have the lyrics of Negro Spirituals to remind us of that. Words were what the Popes of Medieval Christendom used to wage war on countries. Today, we see the effects of the Crusades, all because some men had willed it with their words. Words were what Hitler used to rally the support of millions of German citizens, and instil a sense of nationalism and patriotism within them all. Today, we look back at the horrific results from the rule of a skilled orator and yet an evil, racist, homophobic, misogynist dictator.

Words are amazing. They are beyond comprehension. How is it that we can both look at the same tree, but you describe it in a different way to me? Because the physical appearance of that tree manifests itself in words in our mind in different ways.

Pens are the metaphorical vessels of words. Since we live in the age of technology, I suppose not very many people use pens anymore; we prefer to type. (Speaking of type, I would LOVE a typewriter, actually). But pens, quills and ink, fountain pens, were what many famous poets, writers and singers used to pen their eternal works. The pen was what immortalised Shakespeare, Austen, Chaucer, Poe, Hemingway, Dickens, Tolkien, Orwell, Steinbeck, Woolf, Tolstoy and hundreds of other creatives like them.

So. That’s it. I think I’ve effectively used words to try and explain how words can be used effectively. (Also, the English language is so weird and complicated). To end, here’s a poem which makes me grateful that I grew up speaking English and didn’t have to learn it as a second language. And once again reiterating the power of words, to not only create and destroy… but also to confuse.

I take it you already know
Of tough and bough and cough and dough?
Others may stumble, but not you
On hiccough, thorough, slough, and through.
Well don’t! And now you wish, perhaps,
To learn of less familiar traps.
Beware of heard, a dreadful word
That looks like beard but sounds like bird.
And dead: it’s said like bed, not bead,
For goodness sake don’t call it deed!
Watch out for meat and great and threat
(They rhyme with suite and straight and debt).
A moth is not a moth as in mother
Nor both as in bother, nor broth as in brother,
And here is not a match for there,
Nor dear and fear, for bear and pear.
And then there’s dose and rose and lose–
Just look them up–and goose and choose
And cork and work and card and ward
And font and front and word and sword
And do and go, then thwart and cart,
Come, come! I’ve hardly made a start.
A dreadful Language? Why man alive!
I learned to talk it when I was five.
And yet to write it, the more I tried,
I hadn’t learned it at fifty-five.

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Don’t get too scared. It’s still me. Just newer. And fresher. And more exciting – OOH this is so exciting. I feel like I’m cutting a metaphorical ribbon. (The ribbon is pink, by the way. And satin.)

It took myself and my sister all evening to come up with this. I hope you’re happy, because I certainly am. I feel that this change was necessary and embraces everything about me. The new title, ‘Oops! I Forgot To Think’ is literally me, ALL the time. Sadly. And my tagline, ‘Liberating Mankind from the Comfort of my Bedroom’ will one day be written on the t-shirts of my fans. I quite like it. I feel both parts effectively encapsulate every aspect of ‘Rianna’.

So, since I’m starting again, perhaps an introduction would be in order. Let’s draw a line under this all.

Hi. My name is Rianna. I’m 16 years old.

I’m a blogger, a History enthusiast and a writer. I’m currently writing about 4 books/short-stories (one of which is co-authored) and I fully intend to be published by the time I am 20.

I have the mental age of a 10 year-old, the emotional capability of an over-dramatic 5 year-old, and the maturity of a 3 year-old. I’m not particularly proud to admit those things, but they must be said.

I am happily married (20 years and counting!) with too many children to count. I would also very much like to get married, have a few children and become a housewife. I would also like to be a teacher, of History or English, and not only inspire children (or teens… I’m still not decided on who I want to teach) to follow their dreams, but also help them to become more socially aware. #GetWoke

I am quite dramatic. I love acting and have been in several plays. Drama is one of my A-Level subjects. Because I have very little respect for my life, I chose 4 essay-based subjects.

I’m very good at winged eyeliner. It’s one of my few skills, but one I am very proud of. My wings are always sharp and even; something which seems trivial but gives me great joy.

I wear glasses. I like to read a lot. The latter of which, taking place in dim lighting, caused the former to occur. I mostly read Historical Fiction, my favourite authors being Philippa Gregory and Conn Iggulden. I try and steer clear of cheesy and predictable Romances and Psychological Thrillers. I really can’t stand Psychological Thrillers. Or Crime Thrillers. Or just Thrillers in general.

I would like to study History at University. Studying English at A-Level has made me realise that I DON’T want to study it at Uni.

I’m not very organised. (As the order, or lack thereof, of these points about myself has probably demonstrated to you). I have quite a creative mind, though, I love my Sharpies (WHSmiths Back2School Sale 2k15), and I occasionally draw. I like to draw fancy lettering and calligraphy. I’m quite good at that too.

I’m good at baking cheesecakes. They’re literally the only things I can bake. I make a mean White Chocolate Cheesecake. I can make Lemon and Lime ones too. I’m working on other combinations.

I recently discovered that I like 80s and 90s chick flicks. (Also, please note the reference to ‘The Breakfast Club’ which I – artfully, if I may say so myself – slipped into my title).

I have an issue when people use the wrong ‘your’ and ‘you’re’. It really stresses me out. It causes me a lot of issues.

I have recently self-elected myself the Faerie Squad Mother. That is the symbolism of the image. The glasses are the exact frame I wear, and I just added some wings to connote ‘Faerie’. (Yes, I intended to spell it the ‘old’ way. ‘Fairy’ is just boring, to be entirely honest).

This post is now finished. I should probably go to sleep.

So goodnight, my lovely readers. I hope my new look doesn’t put you off. Have a wonderful day and good morning.

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This is a first. Please do not expect to see those words again anytime soon for two reasons:

No time = No blog posts

I don’t often finish all my homework at the weekend.

Which, yes, I know is probably bad, but I have 5 hours of free periods to do work during the week, so I’m fine. No detentions.

However lovely it may be, I didn’t really come here to small talk. I came here to have a rant, but then I thought, oh no, I can’t do that, because if the people I want to rant about read this rant then… that’s AWKS.

So let’s forgo the rant. Instead, I will channel all my ranty-ness, annoyance and irritation into a blog post which is fuelled with bitterness and malice. (See if you can detect the bitterness and malice and you get a prize! Just to make it even easier for you, I’ll add asterisks to the end of sentence which I took particular care to infuse with bitterness and/or malice. Take note how I even added an asterisk to the title, as it contained those two words! Fantastic!)

So first of all, update on my school life. I’m currently studying English Literature, History, Spanish and Drama – which, you may note are all essay-based subjects! Congratulations, you are correct! They are all essay-based subjects! I have chosen FOUR essay-based subjects!* (<—- asterisk) Let’s start with the best one, shall we?

Drama.* (It wasn’t even a sentence, but I think the tone that I said that in my head DEFINITELY deserved an asterisk)

I hate writing in drama so much. I love acting, I’m pretty good at it (or at least, so says my acting grade) and I am very dramatic.

I HATE WRITING. So naturally, when I was offered to do Drama AS at my school, which was comprised of 100% coursework (i.e. mostly acting and a TINY bit of writing, but no written exam at the end of the year) I was in heaven. As long as I worked hard, that’d be a guaranteed good grade.

Then my school decided to not run it because all the lovely people* (<—- asterisk) who wanted to do it decided not to go to my school. So what happened was I had to go to another school nearby for Consortium to do it. But guess what? Their school doesn’t run the same course that mine does. Their school doesn’t do 100% coursework.

Their school also has a written exam at the end of the year. I can’t NOT do Drama because then I will only have three A-Levels and no AS, but I can’t DO it because I don’t want to do all that lovely writing. Imagine, pages and pages and pages of, not actually writing about my OWN acting, NO, writing about how I would direct a scene that someone else would play. Because I care SO much about how to direct scenes to display the hierarchy between Nora and Krogstad.* (<—- asterisk) (For all those who are interested, we’re studying ‘A Doll’s House’ by Henrik Ibsen; it’s an alright play, but I don’t really want to study and write about how to direct scenes and cast actors, I sort of just want to ACT) No. I don’t care, actually. What I WOULD like to do is hunt down every single one of the students who decided not to come to my school to do Drama AS and give them a box of chocolates.* (<—- asterisk) Like, congratulations. You have made my life so much better, I cannot thank you enough.* (<—- asterisk)

Next subject. Spanish.

I can’t rant very much because I run the risk of being read by people I could potentially rant about, so I’ll just say that it’s going well enough. I was a bit worried at the beginning of the year because we had a girl in our class who was Brazilian and could speak relatively fluent Spanish so I was a bit like …. ? And she was a tad arrogant and I was sorta like, I don’t REALLY like you. I mean, she was fine OUTSIDE of Spanish, but then in the lesson she suddenly got all hoity-toity and I was a bit like, I can’t deal with this. But then she left so I was like fine okay. So we’re RELATIVELY fine.

Next subject. English Lit.

But, let me ask you all, WHAT IS ENGLISH LITERATURE? WHAT IS IT? WHO DEFINES THE RULES WHICH CONFINE ENGLISH LITERATURE TO WHAT IT IS? (English inside joke) Also, we’re reading ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ by Margaret Atwood. Can I just say it is one SHAMAZING book!* (<—- asterisk) It is not at all weird, perverse or warped and it is an entirely COMFORTABLE book to read with your English teacher out loud!* (<—- asterisk) I almost feel the same level of annoyance towards the narrator, Offred, who is an ‘untrustworthy narrator’, as I did towards Atticus Finch, who is the book’s ‘moral compass’. Like, I know I’m NEVER going to be able to get away with not using that phrase to describe the ‘narrative voice’ every time I get an essay about it.

Because I will. Because it’s an ESSAY BASED SUBJECT.* (<—- asterisk)

Next subject. History.

I can’t even complain about this, I’m so surprised. I literally can find NOTHING to whine about with history, so I’ll just add an * so that I feel a little bit less biased towards this subject. Like, I literally abandoned Geography to take History, and it seems to have been, out of all of my options, the best choice. This is weird LOL. I mean, minus the essay-writing obviously, the lessons are actually so fun. And there’s 5 of us in the class (were 4 before, but then Steph dropped Chem, YES STEPH!) and we have top banter. Right now, in Tudor England we’re doing Henry VII – great fun. In Nazi Germany we’re detailing Hitler’s rise to power; it’s actually so interesting.

Wow. Well, there ya go, Pete. Something that I can’t whine about. Are you surprised?

Because I certainly am.

Okay, moving on. Update on my writing life.

I have none.* (<—- asterisk. Also, hyperbole. AYYY getting in them key terms from English Literature) I have written very little since for EVER, I’m working on about forty-trillion things at the same time right now, but they’re not going anywhere because most of the time I’m too a) tired, b) busy or c) annoyed to write anything worthwhile.

So, I have written nothing, my creativity is crumbling to pieces mostly, squad is being torn apart by school and boys are very silly.

Update on my qualification life. Would just like to clarify that even though I have a Masters Degree in ‘Rambling’, ‘Dramatic Queenship’ (I’m going to need to do my Masters in ‘Dramatic Empress-ship’ soon) and ‘Girlology’ amongst other things, I am NOT a qualified Boyologist.* (<—- asterisk) In fact, all you boys just baffle me in general. So it would probably be good if you spoke my language; and you have a choice as well! I speak two languages: Girl and English. Addressing me in either one is fine.* (<—- asterisk) I also speak Fabulous, but I wouldn’t want you to strain yourself too much by trying to pronounce those words. But of course, what would a statement be without a source. So I took the time to ask my good friend, Z (who, by the way, has a pHD in Boyology) why exactly boys are so confusing, to which he answered:

“I don’t know.”

And there you have it ladies and gentlemen. A qualified boy doesn’t even know how to answer a question about his field of qualification.* (<—- asterisk)

I don’t know how I should tie this post up. It seems to have been relatively bitterness and malice filled. I’m sorry Dezza, I didn’t manage to properly roast this roast to a perfect crisp; it’s a bit of a pathetic one, to be honest. This is why I need to set up that page for you guys PRONTO.

Anyways, love everyone. Sleep safe.

Wait, why am I saying sleep safe, it’s only 7:40. (I mean, unless you sleep at 7:40 in which case, fantastic. You go Glen Coco!) But the sunset times are completely throwing me now, and I need to pay more attention to the time, rather than the colour of the sky outside. Winter is coming! (Oh man, I am acutely aware of the fact that I accidently quoted GoT and I hate myself as a result of it).

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I’m going to be petty and childish right now and I have decided that I am just going to WHINE about all those fantastic (and not-so fantastic) books which people decided to turn into movies.

And just to clarify, I will not fight with anyone about this. Books are ALWAYS better than movies. There is never any exception to this rule. If you wish to ensue in a debate about this, feel free to leave a comment and be absolutely obliterated. 🙂

Yes, so perhaps a movie can be an accurate translation of the book (this is often quite rare) and maybe sometimes the movie does the book justice (even rarer), but the only people who can hand-on-heart tell me that movies are ALWAYS better than books are the people who haven’t even read the books.

Or just don’t read in general. (Which is something that upsets my soul to an ever greater extent)

But anyway. There have been so many recent releases of movies which have been taken from – mostly sub-standard – books; a while ago, I was watching a trailer for Mockingjay Part II, and I was just SO mad, because there is so much HYPE about it and barely anyone has even read the series. One trailer describes the movie as an ‘Epic Global Phenomenon’. I DO NOT KNOW WHY THEY ARE HYPING SO MUCH. The series was alright – hardly a phenomenon. I know this will probably get me some hate, but in my opinion, it didn’t deserve to be made into a movie. It was definitely a thrilling, fast-paced read mostly (especially the final book) but I won’t be a kill-joy and tell you who dies. 🙂 At any rate, it wasn’t fantastic, and I would not have thought it an easy transition from book to movie.

It isn’t. (SHOCK HORROR!) Because in the movie, they cut quite a lot from the book. And yes, I get the whole point that you have to cut bits out to make the movie flow more etc. etc. but they cut out PIVOTAL moments from the book. Like where she got her Mockingjay pin from. (HINT HINT: It wasn’t from The Hob). Also, they just seemed to completely miss out a bunch of other things, like the fact that Katniss doesn’t have feelings for Peeta; she has feelings for Gale. But in the movie, they portray her as some greedy girl who can’t seem to make her mind up about who she’s into. (Which, I would assume, is partially the fault of the actors playing her love interests? Clear distraction there…)

Now, I wouldn’t mind so much if they had made this movie with a decent cast; but I think we need to be honest here with each other. Jennifer Lawrence is perhaps the worst Katniss Everdeen they could have cast. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not hating. Jennifer Lawrence is a good actress (and obviously, I can’t hate, because I’m no Dame Maggie Smith) but come on. Of all the female actresses to cast as this kick-ass female heroine, they choose her. J-Law. I kid you not, she has two expressions as Katniss: sad and angry. And they’re both the same face.

Also, we have to keep the sense of realism throughout the book translation into a movie. For example, if I find the protagonist of a book to be portrayed as annoying, ignorant and mostly infuriating (*cough cough* Tris from ‘Divergent’) then I want her to be portrayed in the movie in the same manner. I know I’m not the only one to entirely dislike the main character from the Divergent series, and I am completely okay with the potential hate I may get from that statement, but I really dislike how she is portrayed as so lovely and kind and caring in the movie.

Because she is NOTHING like that in the book. And I completely hate her in the book. So much.

The love interests are always difficult to cast (in my mind at least) because in the books, you always imagine them as being extremely attractive – unless it had been stated otherwise. But then in a movie, if they cast an unattractive (or not particularly aesthetically-pleasing) male as the love interest, then your faith in him wanes and you find yourself shallowly wondering how this guy could ever have possibly gotten her to like him. (The key word here being shallowly).

But the main reason why I strongly dislike books-turned-movies is because you can never read the book in the same way again.

Some of the concepts in the ‘Thursday Next’ series (by Jasper Fforde; I am ALWAYS hyping about this, so they BETTER NOT make this series into a movie!) so accurately describe the process of reading. Basically, they say that reading is as much work on the part of the reader as it is the writer. For readers, we have to take the words and turn them into concepts and images in our minds. We have to do part of the job when reading it, as well as the writers have to do by writing it. No two people can have the same experience when reading the same book.

In the same way, when we are reading and imagining characters, they are each different in each of our minds. The writers can only describe the colour of eyes, hair, the shape of mouths, or expressions of different characters. They cannot give exact proportions for nose height and width, or eyebrow elevation (they could but it’d become pretty damn boring and TOTALLY unnecessary) and as a result, we begin to imagine those features more defined in our minds.

The problem is, when there is a movie, we already have an image and a vision of what the characters look like in our own minds. And, like I said before, no two people can have the same experience when reading the same book. Therefore, you could have anywhere from 1million people upwards, all with different needs to be catered for in terms of the casting… so you can never get the casting EXACTLY right for everybody.

Sometimes, when we read it, we actually imagine the most suited actor in Hollywood as that character, but more often than not, we usually invent some nameless gal or dude in order to visualise the world being created in our minds.

If, by some perversion of nature, I was to sit down and pick up the Hunger Games books to reread, the whole time I’d be reading, I would be imagining Katniss in my mind as Jennifer Lawrence. In my mind, Logan Lerman is forever Perseus Jackson, and now, Mary Boleyn from ‘The Other Boleyn Girl’ has the face of a blonde Scarlett Johansson.

Which is kind of annoying seeing as I can never get those actors out of my mind now and they will forever dominate my thoughts when I visualise these characters (and more who couldn’t even be listed…)

I only really see three solutions to this problem:

a) I stop watching these movies (stopping reading the books isn’t an option),

b) People stop trying to MAKE the books into movies OR

c) I write the script, cast the actors and direct the movie

I’m definitely leaning towards C.

Anyway, I love you all, and peace out.

Queen Rianna

p.s. Since I turn 16 in 2 days, I have decided that Queen is no longer enough. The instant I turn 16, I am being upgraded to Empress. Just to let you know though, this shouldn’t change much; I’m not feeling ‘The Ramblings of An Empress’ to be honest, so I’ll stick with my blog name, I’ll just sign it off differently? I’m working on how this will all be implemented.